, 1887-03-26

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the moon when half wayto full, but of course
immensely larger. You would most likely
make out the great continents, because they
would shine out brighter than the oceans
and seas, which would shew a dark shade. 1t
used to be thought that the duller parts on the
moons surface were oceans, but we now
know that there is no water In the moon. Re
collecting your map the shapes of the con-
tlnents would help you to judge where the
poles were, and perhaps these would also show
out very bright on account of the vast extent
of snow and ice which surrounds them. You
would also know that the equator was half
way between the two poles, and right over
thisata vast distance the sun wouldbe shining.
You would perhaps be a little surprised to
find that the sun shoneo over a trife more than
half of the globe, so that both poles came
within the lighted portion, unless you re-
membered that the atmosphere which sur
rounds the globe causes the light to bend a
little and thus sends it further on. These
things might not surprise you much; but
you would see two things which | think would
astonish you very much, | don't know which
most. The first would be that the earth, IN
stead of shining in a bright blue sky, as the
sun and the moon do for US here on thee earth,
would be seen by you surrounded by intense
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the stars you would see them similarly on a
deep black ground. How so? you say. Well,
it would be because there would be no air
where you were. 1t is the air which causes
the beautiful appearance of the sky; but as
the air keeps close round the earth, wrapping
it round like transparent fluid cloth we might
say, not more than so or 60 miles thick, and
we have fancied you to be out $4,000 miles
from the earth, you perceive that you would
be far far outside the atmosphere and there
would benothing to give the blue background;
all would appear like jet, Awith the diamond
stars, the fiery sun, and the silvery earth and
moon shining out from it, The other thing
which | think would surprise you very much
at your first sight of the earth would be to
see the great ball standing apparently quite
still. You would remember that your teach
er had taught you that the earth revolved,
perhaps he turned the globe in the schoolroom
or took an orange in his hand and turned it
to show what was meant; but now as you
looked at the earth you would not see it move,
only after you had a%ttentively watched some
point of a continent for a few minutes you
would find out that it had moved a little.
Think over the matter and you will see that
this must be so. For the earth turns once
in "a hours. Now if you look at the hour
hand OF a watch you cannot see it move, OF
course you will see after a minute or two that it
has mOred, but you cannot see 1t more. Now
the hour hand of a watch takes IL hours to
go round, the earth takes twice as long and
therefore only revolves half as fast, you would
therefore not be liable to see the motion, al
though you would find it out of course
after a time by seeing the different
points of the land pass one after another
into the dark shadowy half of the globe.
1t is a grand, leisurely roll this daily revo-
luton of our globe. Yet 80 vast is it's size
that we who live not far from the equator are
always being carried forward in the revolution
at the rate OF l 600 miles an hour.
Well then we have gone out q long dis
lance from the earth and have seen how it
would look with the sun crossing the line,
and we have also seen that this crossing
means for US that the warm season, the
Summer of the northern hemisphere, is
coming on, and of course it also means
that the Winter of the southern hemisphere
is drawing near. 1t means also a gradual
frightening of the days in the northern
hemisphere and a shortening of them in the
southern hemisphere. 1t means that the
north pole has emerged from it's 6 months
of night and is entering its 6months of day,
while on the other hand the south pole now
enters its six months of night. It means
many changes in the face of nature and in
the operations of man. And all this de-
ponds on or is caused by q very simple